THE HORRORS OF GROWING OLDER BY EUNICE O

Once we realize how fast time flies in life, we feel good but on most occasions we feel really bad, once a baby, giggling and playing in the mud, dancing under the rain and running naked, hugging our parents and running into their arms when there is a thunder storm, our mothers would hug us tight and the scent of her deodorant would caress our noses, our fathers would carry us on his shoulder and pretend to be an airplane, tickling our tummies and caressing our hair.

Then a pre teen , mothers choosing our outfits and cooking for us and braiding our hair , our head cradled between her legs, or us sitting in front of a mirror , kind of like a vanity , soft hands rested on our scalp , fathers coming home with presents ,scolding us for little faults , and hugging us when we get teary eyed , struggling with sibling on who gets the largest piece of cookie or who gets to clean the house , walking to school or riding the bus with friends , having play dates and tea parties , drinking pretend tea .

Then a teenager , feeling parents are always wrong , mum doesn’t want you to have fun and dad was being too cruel , giggling about boys with friends and dreaming about boys , talking about girls with your friends and drooling about girls , that very cute girl in class , that very cute boy in class , the feeling of going to night parties and partying till dawn , hugging our pillows when we sleep , staring at our very beautiful or very awkward body type in the mirror , trying on makeup for the very first time , asking that girl to prom , still eating mum’s food and feeling good about it , still getting cash from dad and eating take outs , going out with friends to watch movies and making fun of each other .

Then the bachelor and spinster age when we work for cash and a better life , out of our parents house , when we realize our parents were never wrong but only wanted the best for us , finding the perfect boy or girl we want to spend the rest of our life with , dreaming about the time we would say I do , trying not to make the wrong choices but just the right ones , cooking for ourselves and realizing how much we missed mummy’s food and we often day dream about it , we no longer care about petty stuffs but want to focus on brighter things , we begin to learn more and care more about people and stuffs .

After marriage when we realize we have so much responsibilities and sometimes we feel like dropping everything and saying “ I quit” , but we can’t because we soon realize that a brighter future awaits if we just hold on and endure it all , sometimes we think we made grave mistakes in choosing our partners , we also realize that one day we won’t see our parents again , we realize the older we get the more we realize certain facts , we realize every year that passes by either brought great joy or grave sadness , we wish it was still back in the days when we could just sleep and let our parents do all the work but then we also have that same responsibilities towards our kids , we realize the joys of growing a year older is not as much as the horrors and sadness of becoming a year older , we begin to realize how much we would miss our parents once they are gone and we also wish we never grew , if you didn’t think about these thing ………. I did , so much it made my heart bleed , it also made me happy , it made me realize growing older can be fun and also can be horrifying , I wanted to be positive so I dwelt only in the positive part and learnt to be thankful I grew older .

Surely, growing has it’s ups and down but according to a great friend of mine, “your fears of growing older only worsen when you don’t face the truth and appreciate the facts”. Forget about the title, growing older is actually fun. once you understand the meaning of being 1 , not like we can actually stop our selves from growing anyway , it’s great and I want to make growing older worthwhile .